§ SIR JOHN PAKINGTONsaid, he must request permission to answer a Question which had been put to him yesterday by the hon. Member for Nottingham (Mr. Osborne), which he was then unable to answer from want of information on the subject. The hon. Member asked him whether it was true that during the march of a flying squadron from Aldershot nine 1903 men had been attacked by sunstroke, and upwards of eighty-seven men sent to the hospital in consequence of sickness caused by the intensity of the heat? He had informed the hon. Member yesterday that he had at that time received no information upon the subject, but that he would make it his duty to ascertain what the real facts of the case were. He had that morning received a letter from Sir James Yorke Scarlett, Commander-in-Chief at Aldershot, in which that gallant officer stated his great regret that such exaggerated statements should have found their way into the public newspapers. He held in his hand a telegram which had been received from Aldershot yesterday evening, and sent by Sir James Yorke Scarlett, which stated that during the three days that the flying squadron was on the march only three men were sent into the hospital, that no cases of sunstroke had occurred, and that there was only one slight surgical case. It would be recollected that the heat on the first day of the march was very great, but he was happy to say that all the cases of sickness were of a most trifling character.
§ MR. NEATEsaid, he wished to know whether the right hon. Gentleman had received information that on a late occasion, when the Household Brigade was inspected at Wormwood Scrubs, six men had to be carried off the ground and eight others were sent to the hospital?
SIR JOHN PAKIGTONsaid, he had received no information upon the subject of the hon. Member's Question. He would make inquiry into the matter, and he trusted that the statement would prove equally unfounded with that to which he had just referred.